The wooden tipple, shaft, and power
house of the Prosperity tipple as shown in a 1906 picture.

An aerial view of Cranberry showing changes in the company and community over the years. A part of the
Prosperity community can be seen in the background of this 1957 picture.

This building
replaced the
Cranberry company store which
burned in late 1927. The Cranberry post office was located inside the store, at the back. The Cranberry store was closed on 1 September 1958.

The above pictures are from "The New River Company,"
a history of the development of The New River Company
from 1906 to 1976.

When I tell people I
grew up in Southern West Virginia, at Prosperity,
they often ask me where is Prosperity. I tell them that it
is near Beckley. I am never surprised to hear, “Oh,
I've been to Berkeley Springs.” Then I explain that Beckley is in
Southern West Virginia. When I was growing
up, it was considered coal country. It was not unusual
to have some one
tease me that I must have been a coal miner’s daughter. Of course, I
was. Both my dad's and mom's family were coal miners. Both
families lived at Cranberry, a coal mining community near where I was
born. I never lived in a coal mining community since
my parents moved to Prosperity shortly after my brother was born. Yet
coal certainly played a role in my life and many of the other families
in my little community.

I knew what my dad
would look like
when he came home from working all day at the Cranberry mines. He
was covered from head to foot with coal dust. I knew he would be so
tired that he would need to rest after dinner. In the summer time, he
would recline on an old glider we had on
our front porch. When it was too cold to be outside, he’d rest on the
sofa.

My uncles were coal
miners, too. Both of my grandfathers were coal miners. Mom’s dad was killed in a
mine-related accident when mom was eight years old. My
grandfather was
not even 36 years old when he was killed. My grandmother was 8
months’ pregnant when my grandfather
died. The oldest child, a daughter, was 15, when her father died. I
know life was not easy for my
grandmother nor the children. To my grandmother’s credit, all the
children grew up to be responsible God-loving
citizens. In addition to my grandmother raising her own six children, she played a major role in raising two of her grandchildren. In 1928, the husband of my grandmother’s oldest daughter was killed in a mine-related accident. My aunt was 24 at the time with two small children of
her own.

So, I learned at an
early age, that a coal miner had a dangerous job. Early death, bad health, and serious
injury were real concerns. I had two uncles die with cancer of the
lungs. All my relatives who were miners had black lung.

I spoke just this week to a cousin of my dad’s who now lives in Ohio. He mentioned that he had worked in the mines for 16 months when he was a young man. He told me that his brother "got messed up in the mines." They were working together at the time. The cousin left the
coal mines of Virginia and went to Ohio to find work outside the
mines.

Two uncles left the coal mine of Raleigh County to find work in Maryland. Two uncles left Raleigh Countyto find work in Michigan.

A friend of mine once told me that all the smart ones left as soon as they could. He was speaking specifically of our generation. And, I think many of those who left had seen so much suffering by their grandfathers, fathers, uncles, and neighbors as a result of working in the coal mines. We knew there had to be something better, safer, and more rewarding than spending hours crawling on your knees or laying on your back digging coal.

Dan and Ellen Smith, owners of The New River Company Store Antiques at Cranberry, have many mining artifacts, such as timebooks listing the miners who worked at the Cranberry mine. I was able to locate the timebook for my father for the week that I was born.